Physics: Projectiles

This week was a little hairy since students were in and out for AP exams. We continued working on using velocity vs. time graphs to quantitatively describe the motion of projectiles. We wrapped up the week with a practical to predict how far from the edge of the table a marble will land. I spent more time than usual working on breaking up the three phases of motion (constant acceleration while the marble is on the ramp, constant velocity while it rolls across the table, and projectile motion once it leaves the table), but it was still pretty challenging for students to connect when to use the measurements they made in their calculations. Based on the conversations I had with students, I think this fits in with a larger pattern I’ve seen this year with students struggling to connect labs to mathematical and graphical representations. As we move into the last few weeks of the school year, I want to make sure I keep thinking about how to support students in seeing the mathematical and graphical representations as meaningful descriptions of something physical.

AP Physics 1: AP Review

We continued reviewing for the AP exam. I didn’t do anything particularly interesting. We started each day doing a few multiple choice questions on Plickers, then moved into working some released free response. For the free response, I let students pick problems to work on based on the topics they want to work on reviewing. With both the multiple choice and the free response, I made sure we spent some time discussing what the problems illustrate about the type of things that tend to show up on the exam, things that tend to show up on the scoring guide, and strategies for approaching the question. A lot of my students have resisted using the formula sheet this year, and it’s been good to see students getting more comfortable referring to it this week and even using formulas to figure out the significance of the slope and area of graphs they are rusty on.